Asset and CI management

Relationship between asset and CI

It is important to manage the relationship between assets and associated CIs. Assets are
tracked with the Asset Management application, which focuses on the financial aspects of owning
property. Configuration items are stored in the CMDB, which is used to track items and make them
available to users.

When an asset has a corresponding configuration item, the asset record and the configuration
item record are kept synchronized with two business rules.

Note: Assets and CIs can be synchronized only if they are logically mapped.

Asset-CI mapping and synchronization

The State field of asset record and Status field of CI record are synchronized so that changes
made on one form trigger the same update on the corresponding form, ensuring consistent
reporting.

Note: The ServiceNow platform synchronizes updates between assets and configuration items only if
the asset and configuration item are pointed toward each other.

The following diagram illustrates the concept of Asset-CI mapping and synchronization.

Figure 1. Asset-CI mapping and synchronization: An Overview

This synchronization and mapping is based on the following factors:

Asset state and CI status are not mapped on one-to-one basis; rather they are mapped to the
most logical counterpart on the other table. For example, for a hardware asset set to state
In Stock - Pending disposal, the corresponding CI is set to In Disposition with
no substate.

This synchronization happens between the asset’s State field and the following CI fields:

Install Status field: Install Status does not have a sub status and must be used for
non-hardware CIs.

CI to Asset: Change to the CI’s Install Status or Hardware Status updates the logically
mapped asset’s states and sub states.

For a CMDB hardware CI, if both Hardware Status and Install Status is updated, the Hardware
Status change is considered for mapping the corresponding state of the asset.

CI’s Install Status and Hardware Status work independently. There is no correlation between
them. CI’s Hardware Status change does not change CI’s Install Status and vice versa. To avoid
confusion, keeping both status for CMDB CI Hardware is not recommended.

List of the fields that get synced between Asset and CI

When modifying any of following fields on the asset or CI record, the same field on the
corresponding record is automatically updated (with the exception of the
Cost field, which is informational-only on the CI record).

Fixed assets are containers that can hold multiple assets. Fixed assets are commonly tracked at the corporate level by a finance or accounting department, but may contain IT assets such as hardware and software.

Synchronize asset records and CI records by mapping their fields, states, and statuses to each other. Changes made to one record trigger the same updates on the corresponding record, ensuring consistent reporting. You can synchronize out-of-the-box and custom mappings.